The black ocean stirred.
Ren floated in silence — weightless, suspended in the womb of the void. His body, once human, now pulsed faintly with streaks of red light that crawled under his skin like living veins. Around him, space rippled as if the darkness itself bent to his heartbeat.
Then he breathed.
The entire realm shifted.
A pulse of power rippled outward, splitting the surrounding shadows like fragile glass. Fragments of light and memory scattered through the dark, glimpses of an ancient battlefield, of Ryozen's wheel spinning, of Akira's blade screaming against the Sovereign's roar.
Ren's eyes opened — scarlet, burning like twin suns drowned in blood.
"…I remember everything."
His voice echoed softly, yet every syllable sent cracks racing through the air. The void around him began to move — thousands of tendrils rising like serpents, coiling, writhing toward him. They weren't attacking. They were kneeling.
The shadows spoke in whispers:
> "The heir of silence returns…"
Ren's lips curled faintly — neither smile nor sneer, but something colder. "Silence? No. I am the echo that remains when silence dies."
He raised his hand. The tendrils reached toward his palm, merging into a sphere of molten black and crimson. Within it, faint shapes flickered — memories, souls, fragments of forgotten gods.
Ren closed his fingers around it.
Instantly, the entire void trembled.
A crimson sigil flared beneath him — an ancient crest shaped like a reversed sun.
Power surged through him, and his expression hardened.
> "Ryozen… Akira… the balance you cling to is already breaking."
He looked upward, toward where reality still shimmered faintly like a distant sky.
"Soon, you'll see what the end truly means."
The shadows swallowed him whole.
And the void fell silent again — but it was no longer empty. It was alive, waiting.
---
The light returned in a scream.
Ryozen dropped to one knee, gasping. Golden blood spilled down his hand, sizzling against the fractured ground of what used to be the boundary plane between realms. His body trembled — not from exhaustion, but from something deeper. The aftershock of Ren's pulse.
He looked up sharply, his dual-colored eyes reflecting the horizon.
Half light, half dark.
Two realities — barely held together.
He whispered under his breath.
"…No. It can't be."
For the first time in centuries, fear flickered in Ryozen's gaze.
Not for himself — but for what he felt moving beyond the veil.
A heartbeat.
Not Akira's. Not his own.
Ren's.
The space around him distorted slightly. The Wheel of Samsara hovered faintly at his back, spinning slower than usual, its once-perfect symmetry showing small fractures.
He exhaled through his teeth. "So it begins again."
Then he looked down. A faint ripple of energy brushed past him — the trace of Akira's presence. He followed it, tearing open a rift with his glaive.
---
Akira stood on a desolate ridge, the remains of the city stretching far below — broken glass, dying wind, and the faint glow of ash. Yamitsurugi rested across his shoulder, its obsidian edge dim, feeding on the silence.
His half-black eye stared blankly at the sky. There was no emotion, no pain — only stillness.
He felt Ryozen before he saw him.
The air bent — a familiar presence, ancient and immense.
Ryozen stepped through the distortion, his coat shredded, eyes burning with exhaustion and warning.
"Akira."
The younger man didn't turn. His voice was low, even, disturbingly calm.
"You survived."
Ryozen nodded once, then looked around — the devastation, the emptiness, the fading light.
"You changed."
Akira said nothing. His fingers brushed the blade's hilt; faint black energy rippled from the touch, spreading across the ground like cracks in glass.
Ryozen took a cautious step forward. "You awakened your mark completely, didn't you?"
Akira's gaze finally shifted — half-red, half-black, cutting through the air. "It awakened itself."
Silence lingered. The sky darkened slightly, the wind stilling.
Then, softly, Ryozen spoke again. "You felt it too."
Akira's jaw tightened. "…Ren."
Ryozen's expression hardened. "Yes. His presence moved again. The void answered him."
Akira looked down, eyes distant. "Then this isn't over."
Ryozen clenched his hand, summoning faint sparks of gold and black energy that danced along his fingers. "No. It's only begun. The Sovereign's fall opened the seal that bound the lower realm. And Ren—" his voice cracked slightly, "—Ren was the one designed to inherit what comes after the end."
Akira turned sharply. "Designed?"
Ryozen's gaze met his.
"The mark wasn't just a curse or a blessing. It's a vessel — a lineage of the ones who touched creation and survived it. You were the light's vessel. He… was the void's."
Akira's hand tightened around Yamitsurugi. His tone was quiet, but beneath it, something dangerous stirred.
"Then what does that make you?"
Ryozen smiled faintly — bitterly. "The one who failed to stop it before."
He turned away, his aura flickering faintly in the fading twilight.
"But this time… I'll end it — before the cycle begins again."
Akira watched him — silent, unmoving. Then, for the first time since he returned, the mark on his neck dimmed slightly, reacting to something distant — something calling.
He whispered, "…He's close."
Ryozen stopped mid-step. "What?"
Akira lifted his head, eyes burning red.
"He's here."
The wind suddenly reversed — air rushing inward toward a single point in the sky. The clouds folded, bending into a spiraling void. Crimson lightning streaked through the storm.
Ryozen spun his glaive, aura flaring gold and black. "He's manifesting already?!"
Akira didn't answer. He raised Yamitsurugi, the black aura around it erupting into violent arcs of voidlight.
The ground cracked. Space screamed.
Then, the sky split open.
From the heart of the storm, a figure descended slowly — wrapped in chains of living shadow. His crimson eyes cut through the storm like blades. His feet touched the ground without a sound.
Ren.
Ryozen's grip tightened. "Impossible… he shouldn't have reached this plane yet."
Ren looked between them — first at Akira, then Ryozen.
When he spoke, his voice was calm — too calm.
> "You both still fight for balance. You still believe in a world that was never meant to exist."
Akira's blade hummed, responding to his rage. "You were supposed to die."
Ren smiled faintly. "Maybe I did. But the void doesn't end things. It keeps them… waiting."
Ryozen's aura surged. "What do you want, Ren?"
Ren's red eyes softened — not in kindness, but pity.
> "I want to show you what you tried to forget."
He raised his hand.
The ground shattered. Chains of red energy shot outward, snaking across the field.
Ryozen spun his glaive, deflecting two — but a third wrapped around Yamitsurugi, locking Akira in place.
Akira's mark blazed — half light, half void. His expression twisted with fury. "You think I'll let you—"
Ren interrupted, voice low, almost mournful.
> "You already did."
The chains exploded into pure crimson light.
Ryozen lunged forward, shouting — "Akira!" — but the blast hit first. A wave of red and black energy tore through the ground, swallowing everything in silence.
---
When the dust settled, Ren stood alone.
The air shimmered. Far away, he could feel them — both alive, but divided. Exactly as he needed them to be.
He exhaled slowly, eyes dimming back to cold crimson.
"The cycle always repeats," he whispered to himself. "But this time, I'll break it — even if it means becoming the end itself."
The void above him cracked open, bleeding faint light into the night.
Ren stepped forward, disappearing into it.
---
The storm calmed.
And far below, amidst the rubble, Akira stirred — half-conscious, his mark still burning faintly.
Ryozen lay nearby, his glaive shattered, his wheel dimmed but still turning weakly.
For a moment, both men breathed in unison — light and dark, beaten but not broken.
And from somewhere beyond hearing, Ren's voice drifted through the wind.
> "The dusk has veins, and they all lead to you."
The world trembled.